Sort a 2D array by the second value

Question

I have an array and I want to sort by the number field not the name.

var showIt = [
  ["nuCycleDate",19561100],
  ["ndCycleDate",19460700],
  ["neCycleDate",0],
  ["nlCycleDate",0]
];

Thanks

Answer 1

You can provide sort with a comparison function.

showIt.sort(function(a, b) {
    return a[1] - b[1];
});

a and b are items from your array. sort expects a return value that is greater than zero, equal to zero, or less than zero. The first indicates a comes before b, zero means they are equal, and the last option means b first.

Answer 2

This site advises against using the arguments without assigning to temporary variables. Try this instead:

showIt.sort(function(a, b) {
    var x = a[1];
    var y = b[1];
    return x - y;
});